Report: Bush Administration Fails to Accomplish Mission on Immigration

A new report by Third Way (here) finds that enforcement of immigration laws during the first five years of the Bush Administration is down 30% from the last five years of the Clinton Administration, despite an increase in border personnel. The report, entitled Mission Accomplished II, estimates that it would take 109 years to deport all of the 12 million illegal immigrants currently in the country under the Bush enforcement rate. Click here for a link to a pdf of the report.

Third Way’s website describes itself as “a non-profit, non-partisan strategy center for progressives.”  CNN (here) describes the group as politically “moderate.”

There is another  study on immigration enforcement that is worth reading.  A Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC) analysis of millions of detailed records obtained from the Immigration Courts (EOIR) under the Freedom of Information Act offers many insights on immigration enforcement. One intersting fact — despite the “war on terror,” there are few deportations based on charges of terrorism.  A link to the TRAC Report “Immigration Enforcement: The Rhetoric, The Reality” can be found BY clicking on a link on the Law Librarian blog here.

KJ